Reign of Error;Or,the Case against Cognitive Cultural Relativism

Abstract

Many social theorists and philosophers now say truth is cultural convention and no culture is privileged, so the cognitive ideas different cultures maintain – say, magic and physics – are equally true. That is the bottom line of cognitive cultural relativism alias postmodernism, which pervades the social sciences and humanities. Cognitive cultural relativism should be distinguished from moral cultural relativism, which says there is no universal morality, only cultural values and norms – the latter is a tragedy, the former is a farce: it is a contradiction in logic, an absurdity as theory, and humbug as method. It insults the cultures it defers to and legitimates dogmatism, which motivates fanaticism; it invites – indeed, practically demands – what it pretends to combat.